The Ministry of Agriculture and the Taiwanese armed forces are to hold a joint natural disaster response drill in Hualien later this month, in the first collaboration of its kind, the ministry said.
Officials from the Agency of Rural Development and Soil and Water Conservation made the announcement on Thursday at a news briefing marking the start of Soil and Water Conservation Month.
The agency plans to conduct 40 exercises across Taiwan throughout the month to bolster resilience against the growing threat of extreme weather events, Deputy Director-General Wang Chin-lun (王晉倫) said.
Photo: Yang Yuan-ting, Taipei Times
In the Hualien drill, the military would take a leading role, focusing on training local authorities to carry out large evacuations in the event of simultaneous flooding and earthquakes, he said.
If the drill proves successful, the agency would consider scaling up the exercises and expanding them to other jurisdictions, he added.
The agency also held an award ceremony to honor volunteer emergency responders with a decade of service or more.
Among the recipients was nearly 70-year-old Fan Heng-chih (范姮枝), who became a volunteer after Typhoon Morakot ravaged Kaohsiung’s Jiasian District (甲仙) in 2009. She recalled how the storm triggered landslides that caused one hill to collapse into another, permanently reshaping the district’s terrain.
Fan urged greater public awareness of natural disaster risks, adding that all six hills in her district remain vulnerable to mudslides if another major storm were to hit.
The graying of the agency’s volunteer emergency responder team is almost as alarming as the threat of natural disasters, she said, adding that a crew of three volunteers often has a combined age of more than 200 years.
People of all ages and genders should consider joining the volunteer force because natural disasters do not discriminate, she said.
Chen Shen-che (陳聖哲), a former agency employee who is 70 years old, said he joined the volunteer team after retiring from the civil service 10 years ago.
He said he is grateful for the chance to apply his experience, adding that helping people evacuate from dangerous homes is an important part of a volunteer’s duties.
Citing an example, Chen said he once stayed from 9am to 3am the following day trying to persuade a 90-year-old man to leave his home, ultimately succeeding after hours of patient conversation.
The public needs to be more aware of their community’s disaster risks to make informed decisions about when evacuation is necessary, he said.
The Ministry of Education (MOE) is to launch a new program to encourage international students to stay in Taiwan and explore job opportunities here after graduation, Deputy Minister of Education Yeh Ping-cheng (葉丙成) said on Friday. The government would provide full scholarships for international students to further their studies for two years in Taiwan, so those who want to pursue a master’s degree can consider applying for the program, he said. The fields included are science, technology, engineering, mathematics, semiconductors and finance, Yeh added. The program, called “Intense 2+2,” would also assist international students who completed the two years of further studies in
Former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) departed for Europe on Friday night, with planned stops in Lithuania and Denmark. Tsai arrived at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport on Friday night, but did not speak to reporters before departing. Tsai wrote on social media later that the purpose of the trip was to reaffirm the commitment of Taiwanese to working with democratic allies to promote regional security and stability, upholding freedom and democracy, and defending their homeland. She also expressed hope that through joint efforts, Taiwan and Europe would continue to be partners building up economic resilience on the global stage. The former president was to first
Former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) on Monday called for greater cooperation between Taiwan, Lithuania and the EU to counter threats to information security, including attacks on undersea cables and other critical infrastructure. In a speech at Vilnius University in the Lithuanian capital, Tsai highlighted recent incidents in which vital undersea cables — essential for cross-border data transmission — were severed in the Taiwan Strait and the Baltic Sea over the past year. Taiwanese authorities suspect Chinese sabotage in the incidents near Taiwan’s waters, while EU leaders have said Russia is the likely culprit behind similar breaches in the Baltic. “Taiwan and our European
The Taipei District Court sentenced babysitters Liu Tsai-hsuan (劉彩萱) and Liu Jou-lin (劉若琳) to life and 18 years in prison respectively today for causing the death of a one-year-old boy in December 2023. The Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office said that Liu Tsai-hsuan was entrusted with the care of a one-year-old boy, nicknamed Kai Kai (剴剴), in August 2023 by the Child Welfare League Foundation. From Sept. 1 to Dec. 23 that year, she and her sister Liu Jou-lin allegedly committed acts of abuse against the boy, who was rushed to the hospital with severe injuries on Dec. 24, 2023, but did not